Cheaper food items along with some of the fuel and manufactured products saw the inflation hit a 13-month low of 4.22% in the week ended June 4, even as markets feared the price level to rise in the coming days due to an imminent hike in petro prices.The point-to-point wholesale price index (WPI) inflation fell for the sixth consecutive week by an impressive about 1% from the previous week's 5.20%.It was as high as 6.70% in the year ago period, thus showing that the recent declines in inflation is more due to the base year effect.Reserve Bank Governor Y V Reddy had recently said core inflation was still low in the country."The short term outlook for domestic inflation and recent remarks by rbi governor shall provide support to the market," a primary dealer said. But the concern will obviously be if there is price hike notably in diesel, which forms the bulk of the transportation costs in the country, the dealer added.WPI rose by 0.2% to 192.5 points due to increase in the index of fuel products, while there was fall in the indices of primary articles and manufactured products. The index was 184.7 points in the year ago period.During the week in review, world oil prices surged to over $54 a barrel owing to concerns over strong demand overshadowing increases in US crude stockpiles and disruption to exports leaving Iraq.Government revised upwards inflation to 5.86% during the week ended April 9 as compared to the provisional estimate of 5.48%.WPI stood corrected at 191.4 points in the second week of April as against provisional level of 190.7 points.Primary articles' group index declined by 0.2% to 188.7 points due to cheaper food articles even as non-food articles became costlier. The index was 191.1 points a year ago period.Food articles' group index fell by 0.5% to 190.1 points due to lower prices of fruits & vegetables (three per cent each) and bajra (one per cent). But, prices moved up for condiments & spices (two per cent) and gram, barley, urad and moong (one per cent each).Non-food articles' group index was up 0.4% to 180.3 points owing to higher prices of logs & timber and soyabean (five per cent each), castor seed (two per cent) and copra (one per cent).However, prices fell for safflower (eight per cent), raw silk and raw rubber (two per cent each) and sunflower (one per cent).A five per cent spurt in electricity prices moved up the fuel, power, light and lubricants' group index by over 1.0 per cent to 296.3 points, but naphtha prices shot up 12% and the index was 266.1 points in the year ago period.The heavy-weighted manufactured products group index was down by 0.1 per cent to 170.6 points even as food products, rubber and transport equipment became costlier. The index was 164.4 points a year ago.Food products group index rose by 0.1 per cent to 173.9 points due to higher prices of skimmed milk powder (four per cent), unrefined oil (two per cent) and oil cakes & gur (one per cent each).However, there was one per cent decline each in the prices of coconut oil, rice bran oil, hydrogenated vanaspati and ghee, one per cent rise in the prices of scented chewing tobacco pushed up marginally the index for beverages tobacco & tobacco products' group to 222.3 points.Textiles' group index was down by 0.3 per cent to 131.1 points due to lower prices of polyster staple fibre (six per cent) and nylon filament yarn (two per cent).But prices rose for tyre cord fabric (11 per cent), hessian & sacking bags (three per cent) and hessian cloth (one per cent).Paper and paper products' group index declined by 0.1 per cent to 177.5 points owing to fall in the prices of pulp (three per cent) and newsprint (one per cent), but printing paper white became costlier by one per cent.Five per cent rise in the prices of plastic containers led to 0.1 per cent increase in the index of rubber and plastic @roducts' to 136.7 points.Chemicals and chemical products' group index was down by 0.1% to 186.5 points due to cheaper purified terephthalic acid (11 per cent) and acid (one per cent), even as caustic soda became costlier by one per cent.Fall in cement prices pushed down the non-metallic mineral products' group index by 0.2% to 168.4 points. Two percent decline in colour tv sets prices led to 0.1 per cent fall in the index of machinery and machine tools' group to 145.6 points.Two per cent hike in mopeds prices moved up the transport equipment & parts' group index by 0.1 per cent to 159.1 points.
